“Twelve knots will be acceptable. If the mast bends, I’ll find a way to survive until we can return to port.”
“Of course, we’ll be slower on the surface, if you need to surface to reduce seawater pressure for the damage control teams.”
“You’ve seen the same status reports I have about what the Goliath is doing on the surface. I won’t become its next target.”
“I understand, sir. But are you concerned about keeping our induction mast exposed? The attacks on our surfaced ships suggest that our enemy is getting high-altitude imaging support.”
“I’ve asked fleet headquarters for an infrared view of our location, and it’s very difficult to distinguish us from the ambient seas. Our intake isn’t hot enough to make us easy to detect, and we’d be traceable by satellite or aircraft only once found.”
A sound-powered phone chirped by the veteran’s hand.
“May I, sir?”
“Of course.”
The veteran lifted the receiver.
“Control room,” he said.
Volkov watched the man’s face relax.
“That’s great news. I’ll tell the captain.”
“What news?”
“The executive officer reports that watertight integrity is restored to the berthing compartment down to fifty meters by having sealed the battery compartment.”
“Good.”
“Shoring is in place in auxiliary machinery, not watertight, but the drain pump can keep pace with the flooding down to fifty meters. He also reports that holes in auxiliary machinery can be sealed with welding, if you’re willing to risk the noise. Estimated time to repair the auxiliary machinery room is eight hours.”
“That’s a fine report from him. It sounds like the operations officer and engineer coached him through some damage control.”
“I know you don’t like him, sir.”
“He’s useless because he doesn’t care. He doesn’t need to care, since his connections are strong.”
“May I speak frankly?”
Volkov furrowed his brow.
“You? Always.”
“I think you’ve rattled him enough already. He’s going to command a submarine someday, whether he deserves it or not. Perhaps you can consider being more of a mentor for the rest of this mission. You’ve got his attention and have earned his respect.”
Volkov grunted.
“What do I care about earning his respect?”
“You already said it, sir. Because his connections are strong.”
“I’ll consider it.”
“What about our orders, sir? The crew is concerned about what’s next for us.”
“Nothing yet. The fleet is awaiting my updated damage report before assigning me a new task.”
“We’ve been through a big scare, sir. There were a lot of crosses in hands and praying before that torpedo hit us, and I also know embarrassing details about some men’s reactions that are best kept to myself.”
“The rumors will spread. They always do. Tears, sobbing, and soiling of undergarments, I’m sure. But how’s the crew now?”
“They have resolve, sir. They saw your courage and coolness under fire, and they would follow you anywhere.”
“I suppose that now’s the time to have a look at the damage myself. Once I’ve confirmed the reports, I’ll inform the fleet that we’re ready for battle. In fact, have that message queued up to broadcast, and include the battery damage so they know our limits.”
He walked across the control room and passed through the watertight door. The scullery and dining areas appeared unperturbed, except for the humidity created by evaporated and trapped seawater vapor. He walked down a stairway to the sleeping quarters, where he found a junior officer and two enlisted sailors.
“I had expected more people,” he said.
“The battery well is sealed, sir,” the officer said. “It’s designed to be airtight against hydrogen gas. So it’s watertight, too, but only to a limited depth. The executive officer stationed us here to react in case we lose watertight containment.”
“What would you do if we lost watertight containment?”
The young officer’s confident and quick reaction suggested that he had foreseen the question, or perhaps that the executive officer had come to life and coached him.
“First, I’d grab this phone and announce the flooding so that the ship could come shallow. Then, I’d await orders to proceed, but I’d be ready with these tools to cut open the air pipes and reseal them with the wooden shoring plugs you see next to the tool. It’s the valves on those air pipes that are most likely to fail under pressure if we go deep, and that’s how I’d take care of them. We’d have a leak around the plugs, but we wouldn’t have flooding.”
“Impressive. How long are you going to be standing watch here? Do you have a relief planned?”
“All three of us will stay here until whatever end, sir, unless you need us somewhere else. The toilets are right there, and people will bring us food and water as needed. You can count on us.”
Volkov excused himself and returned up the stairs. At the top, he turned sternward and continued to the auxiliary machinery compartment.
He passed electronic cabinets and then descended rungs to the lower level. There, he saw men hunched over the floor, holding lanterns and passing tools to sailors hidden under the deck plates. The executive officer stooped among them and stood when he noticed Volkov.
“Sir, we have two holes in the compartment. The larger one is here, below the refrigeration unit. It took some ingenuity, but the engineer had a team remove the covers off some lockers, spot weld them together, and bend them to conform to the hull’s shape. It’s far from perfect, but it’s slowing the flooding.”
Volkov grabbed a small flashlight from his hip and then crawled on his belly to the edge of the deck plating. Wiggling his head and arm between the weight-bearing plates and the hull’s insulating lagging, he gained an inverted view of the crawlspace under the refrigeration unit.
The salty humidity and musty scent convinced him that his ship would begin rusting.
Two men lying on their shoulders with drenched jumpsuits lifted their heads. He recognized a senior engineering sailor who tapped a hammer against the final block to press a wooden peg between the underside of the deck and the repurposed locker doors. Water sprayed from the edges of the flat, trapped metal.
“How bad is it?” Volkov asked.
“Captain? Is that you, sir?”
“It’s me.”
“It’s not as bad as it looks. These pegs will hold until we can get some proper welding done. The water flows forward from here, and the smaller hole in the back corner of the compartment has a lesser flow rate. Both streams will flow forward if you keep the ship level, and the operations officer is stationing a bilge pump to route the streams to the trim and drain system. Our pumps will keep up.”
“Great job.”
“Thank you, sir. We’re still a fighting ship.”
Volkov retracted his head from the crawlspace and pushed himself to his knees. He then felt lightheaded as he stood, and he grabbed the executive officer’s shoulder for balance and to get the man’s attention.
“Yes, sir?”
“Good work,” Volkov said. “Keep it up.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Something had transformed his second-in-command from a wart to a leader. He wondered if he should credit the fear of combat, the desire for self-preservation, or perhaps his own tough leadership. Delaying judgment for future consideration, he climbed the ladder and continued his sternward trek to the engineering space.
He passed the storage tanks carrying oxygen and hydrogen, the energy sources for the giant machine of fuel cells that combined the elements to create water and the electricity.
After shutting another watertight door behind him, he passed between the ship’s twin diesels. They hummed and chattered atop rubberized mounts that trapped their acoustic emanations.